What is the social message and what is the social business
Format: double-spaced, 1 inch margins, 12 point font. The paper should be well- organized, free of excessive errors, and formal in tone. See length guidelines below.
All sources should be cited following the American Anthropological Association’s preferred citation and bibliographic style.
Prompt: The assignment is to use a single example of language in use (captured in your transcript) as the basis for a linguistic anthropological analysis using terms, concepts and theoretical tools from the course readings, films and lectures. The goal of your analysis should be to illuminate what is going on in your transcript from both a semiotic and pragmatic perspective; what is the social message and what is the social business, or what is being said and what is being done in this speech act/event.
Remember that this paper takes the place of a final exam: as such, while your analysis may demonstrate creativity and originality of thought, it should primarily demonstrate your understanding of the relevant terms, concepts and ideas about language.
Structure:Your final LitW assignment will be divided into three separate parts:
1) The final version of your transcript. (~150 words suggested maximum)
2) A clear description that provides complete, relevant contextual information about participants, setting, language varieties used, norms specific to this kind of interaction, relying on minimal inference or interpretation. (300-500 words)
3) Analysis of the speech act/event from semantic and pragmatic (what is meant and what is done) perspectives, using relevant concepts and analytical frameworks from the course. (600-1000 words/3-5 pages)
• What concepts, categories or ideas about language from the course are relevant to this interaction?
• Start out by using course concepts or vocabulary to describe what’s going on in the interaction.
• Think about what a given framework of analysis would lead us to expect.
o E.g. for a language socialization event in a mainstream, middle-class American household, we would expect that this interaction is likely to take the form of a face-to-face, dyadic exchange, babytalkwill be used, that the caregiver will scaffold the child’s attempts to produce coherent speech, etc.
• Is that what’s going on? Does the interaction conform to expectations? Why or why not?
o Think about variables that may differ from the cases we have seen: age of the child? Relationship of caregiver to child? Cultural differences?
• Think about different levels of meaning: What is being said vs. what is being done.
o What aspects of the speech act/event itself give us clues as to what message is being conveyed, or what social business is being accomplished?
– This might include looking at the referential content of what is said, at what features of the social context are being “pointed to,” paralinguistic cues, conformity or violation of social norms, etc.
